The Housing Rights Index (HRI).

 

The Housing Rights Index (HRI) is a tool developed to assess how well the right to adequate housing is recognized, respected, and protected within a specific city or region. The HRI focuses on the practical application of the seven universally recognized elements of adequate housing adequacy:

1. Legal security of tenure (protection from forced evictions)
2. Availability of services, materials, facilities, and infrastructure
3. Affordability (subsidies, tax incentives, and market regulation)
4. Habitability (protection from cold, damp, heat, rain, wind, and structural threats)
5. Accessibility (specifically for disadvantaged and marginalized groups)
6. Location (access to employment options, health-care services, schools, and child-care facilities)
7. Cultural adequacy (expression of cultural identity)

 
The primary goal of the index is to help local governments and urban planners measure and improve the extent to which their communities can gain and sustain a safe, secure home in which to live in peace and dignity. The Housing Rights Index (HRI) is a decision-support tool developed specifically for the use of housing practitioners and policy makers who are involved in the Housing Practitioners Labs and tailor-made training developed and conducted by UN-Habitat. It is based on the right to adequate housing as enshrined in international human rights instruments and included in the Habitat Agenda (1996) and the New Urban Agenda (2016) . It is understood as the right of every individual and community to gain and sustain a safe and secure home in which to live in peace and dignity.

The tool has both pedagogic and policy development roles. On the one hand, the deployment of the index will enhance the user’s understanding of the practical meaning of adequate housing rights and enable a better understanding of the policy and practical implications of the seven elements of adequacy that defines the right to adequate housing. On the other hand, the tool supports the user’s assessment of the housing sector with a specific look at the extent to which adequate housing rights are recognized, respected, realized and protected in his/her city. Indeed, the present and former Special Rapporteurs, and numerous treaty bodies, have stressed on the importance of needing reliable and clear data and indicators to assess the progress made by different regions towards the realisation of the right to adequate housing6 . The HRI responds precisely to this call. By default, while employing the tool in the analysis of the housing policy achievements in his/her city or country, users will be able to unveil which of the elements of the housing rights are poorly or adequately realized. The visualization and scoring of the user’s policy analysis will reveal an index which will support the design of future policy interventions to improve the realization of housing rights in his/her city or country, addressing the identified shortcomings and strengthening existing positive results. It goes without saying that both the analysis and scoring are in principle based on qualitative analysis, but the more in-depth analysis, documentation and literature researched are reviewed to sustain the use of the HRI and the scoring of the seven dimensions of adequacy, the more accurately the outcome will reveal the real challenges in housing policy and practice in a given city or country. This will inform debate, help to raise questions and support the design of policies and strategies to mitigate and/or change the situation.

The Housing Rights Index: A Policy Formulation Support Tool